The Year of Living Differently
by Zebee
Summary: This is the prequel to Transformation. The Pre-Azkaban stuff. Snape does a year at a Muggle university after leaving Hogwarts, andfinds things are not as he was brought up to believe. COMPLETE
1. The Partner

The Year of Living Differently  
------------------------------- 

Author's Note: This is the prequel to Transformation. The Pre-Azkaban stuff. Snape does a year at a Muggle university after leaving Hogwarts, and finds things are not as he was brought up to believe. I suppose I need to say that the characters you recognise belong to JK Rowling, the ones you don't... don;t. This first chapter inspired by SilverFox's story "Runaway Dragon' 

Chapter 1 - The Partner  
----------------------- 

She'd been surprised to find another wizard-born here, certainly in these classes. They might slum it for a summer school on literature, but BSc(Chem) was not at all usual. Neither was BSc(Pharmacy), she supposed. 

She had gravitated towards him as a lab partner in their shared classes, seeing his natural talent and his finicky perfectionism. That usually turned people off, but she had some of that herself and enough self-preservation to realise that if she was going to do well, such a partner was a bonus. It wasn't till the 3rd or 4th week that she realised he was as deficient as she was or maybe more so in some areas, and not until even later that she realised it was because he was wizard-born. 

He was disturbing to be around, it was the intensity. Whether he was focusing his entire soul on a titration, or striding through the corridors like an avenging angel, or devouring books as though he were starving and they were steak, he did it with a most terrifying concentration. 

He was brighter than she was, and better educated, even in muggle science. An expensive crammer had apparently shoveled matriculation science and maths down his throat as fast as he could swallow. 

But he was lost outside a lab or a library, he was bewildered by the topsyturvey upside-down mirror world he was living in, and by the people around him. Not, she thought, just because they were muggles. 

She'd had more exposure to this world than he'd had, but then he was old blood, you could tell by the accent, and the casual way he thought about money, and by the beautiful things in his room, the one time she went there on a detour with him to fetch something he'd forgotten. And everyone knew the old families didn't go near muggle things, especially not now! 

So she helped him with the things he found strange and he helped her with the things she did, and they coped in the mirror world well enough. 

She didn't ask him what he was doing here, the way he constantly asked questions and grabbed at information as though time was precious and it might all leak through his fingers told her that. 

He did ask her one day. 

They'd finished the set work early, and she'd finally managed to get him to forsake his new love, the chromatograph, and eat for once. 

When he'd come down off his new-toy-induced high, and was back in the land of the living again, he'd asked. 

"Well... I had a part time job with a muggle apothecary, they call them pharmacists. He taught me some things that made a lot of sense and he thought I should study pharmacy, I had an aptitude for it. I applied for here and for an internship at St Mungos, and this came through," 

"You want to work in the dispensary at Mungos? Or maybe be a pharmacist?" 

"I want to do a degree in medical potions I think, I don't mind the muggle world, but I don't want to live here forever. I hope I can get accepted if I do well in this degree." 

"I want to do a Potion Master research degree. I want to specialise in Alchemy" he said, startling her. He never talked about himself! 

Except once, when he'd told her he was Slytherin, explaining a reaction he'd had to some student politicking that had disturbed one of their classes. He'd not said anything about the more unsavoury aspects, but she'd heard of those from elsewhere. If he was prejudiced he hadn't shown much sign of it so far though, 

"And for that you need Chemistry". 

"And for that I need Chemistry, And Maths. But there's so much to learn, I thought maybe a year and I'd have enough, but there's so much to learn!" 

He'd said it with a sort of joyful wonder, a kid in a toyshop, all alone. No bullies or parents or family obligations, just him and all those shelves.... 

She watched him, thinking how happiness changed his face. He wasn't interested in anything but his work of course, and she wasn't interested in any dalliance with someone who would be back to his old family lineage and his Slytherin associates after this brief sojurn in another world. 

She wouldn't *want* to follow him there. She didn't belong. And she didn't like what she'd heard about it. 

But she enjoyed his company. Enjoyed his enthusiasm and his delight in the new things around him. here in this odd bubble of time, in this different world. 

------------------ 


	2. Interlude

The Year of Living Differently  
------------------------------- 

Chapter 2 - Interlude  
--------------------- 

He used his sliderule, quick and precise, watching the way the numbers danced, the relationships between them changing and unchanging, reforming and recombining, chaotic only on the surface, satisfyingly logical and predictable and perfect. He zeroed in on the answer, reading the scales and judging the magnitude, obtaining all sorts of things from the relationships beyond the raw figures. An amazing invention, pure poetry. 

His lab partner punched the numbers into her calculator, and the machine spat out the answer, exactly what was asked, no more and no less. No side alleys, no context, no links between disparate pieces of infomation revealing new vistas, no warning of wrong questions asked or dangerous assumptions, just the red impersonal digits answering exactly what was asked and revealing nothing else. 

He despised the machine at the time, but later on he was to value its lesson. With the pain coursing through him, the Veritaserum bitter on his tongue, and lives riding on the things he revealed. 

------------------ 


	3. The Teacher

The Year of Living Differently  
------------------------------- 

Chapter 3 - The Teacher  
----------------------- 

The first year classes are the best of times and the worst of times. 

Usually you have a bunch of kids straight from school, used to following experiments in their books and writing them up, never encouraged to think or question. Despite the obligatory lectures on the scientific method which probably made as much sense to them as any other sermon. 

But in that collection of "will this be on the exam" whiners, timeservers, timewasters, yobbos only here for drinking and sex and bloody football, in that mess you sometimes find a diamond. 

I thought that I might have found one in the tall kid with the odd accent and the intense black eyes. Mind you he was woefully backward in some things, not really surprising given the state of education today. 

He'd apparently come from some exclusive boarding school, all games and Latin and buggery in the showers I suppose. But the boy was genuinely interested, and that was rare enough that the deficiencies could be overlooked. 

He seemed to have a decent theoretical knowledge, but his lab skills were not at all up to it. He had an eye for colour and a nose for smells, and a feel for temperature and changes, and there's no doubt he had a way of absorbing the theory like Kleenex, but he'd never seen half the gear before and had no clue about how to write things up. He'd stop, lost, in the strangest of places. 

But that was fixable. That just needed practice, the core of the business was there, the desire... no, the *hunger* to learn and to understand. 

So I pushed him. Hard. Gave him everything he could take and then some. He'd thrived on it, the way the good ones do, even on the scut work! 

You don't find them often, but when you do it makes up for all the clods and the football players, and the bloody bureaucracy. 

Good postgrad material I'd decided, towards the end of the year. Sometimes you couldn't tell till they'd had the kick upside the head of a few failing marks in first year and got themselves the hell out of the bar and into the lab, but this one didn't seem to drink or party. Although there had been a couple of missed tutorials and some pretty poor explanations. 

"So, any idea what you'll do for honours? " I'd asked, near the end of the year. "It's still a while away, but you'll have to plan your course of study soon," 

I'd not expected the flinch, or the shattered look. Or the bombshell of "I.. I won't be coming back next year Sir. " 

"What? You are joking!" 

"I can't Sir. He won't let me." Eyes down, world in pieces. 

"He? Who is he? What do you mean? Is it money? There are such things as scholarships you know." 

The boy was ready to run, what on Earth was going on? And he'd dropped that Sir business months ago, what had got into him all of a sudden? "Is it your father? Is that it? Come on man, this isn't the bloody Middle Ages, you are old enough to make up your own mind!" 

"I know Sir, I'm sorry Sir, I can't Sir!, I'm late for another class Sir" and the kid had got out so fast it was like he was flying. But it was the weekend, there were no other classes. 

It was one of the saddest moments of my teaching career, losing that lad. 

Oh, he'd turned up to the final lectures, he'd done the last major assignment and the exams, but he'd not done as well as expected, and he'd avoided being caught alone or talking about himself. And he'd not turned up the following year. 

Probably been under his father's thumb all his life and too scared to rebel. Funny though, he hadn't seemed to be the timid type. Someone or something had a hold of him though, no question. 

What a waste! 

------------------ 


	4. The Result

The Year of Living Differently  
------------------------------- 

Chapter 4 - The Result  
---------------------- 

It was odd, living in this world. He felt free here, but he knew it was an illusion. 

Something had changed in him, things were no longer as certain as they were. He'd known, even before he went to Hogwarts, that he'd been different. That his intellect was different, his hungers different. Malfoy, MacNair, Avery, they'd been hungry alright. Power was their god, power and what it could get them. 

He'd been hungry too, after all that's why he was in Slytherin wasn't it? The Hat had said as much. "Yes, yes, old family, Slytherin time out of mind, but you've got that Ravenclaw intellect haven't you. No doubt though, you won't settle for just knowing, you want to do things with that knowing. And you want the power that comes with it, so it's obviously SLYTHERIN" 

He'd not been in any doubt really, after all he'd been brought up to it. To the understanding of power and politics, to the very-far-from-simple world of the old family purebloods with their alliances and their version of ethics, their unconscious prejudices, and their very conscious actions. 

He'd gravitated to the power structures quite early on, he'd known that the the only power he had, the only way he could protect himself, was by using his abilities. His path was clear. 

He had to make himself a valuable resource, and then the ones with the muscles would be told to protect him instead of beating him up. 

And so when he had the chance to go with Lucius to the Dark Lord, it really hadn't taken much effort to decide to go. Hogwarts was full of the mediocre, the Ministry was full of the medicore, Voldemort was running rings around them. He was gratified to see that the Dark Lord knew his value. This was a hell of a lot better than being hounded by those damned Gryffindors who wouldn't know something was valuable without a label signed "Dumbledore". And probably not even then. 

He was startled when he'd been asked what he wanted to do, but he grabbed the chance. "I want to do a Potion Master degree my Lord" he'd said. And because he hadn't yet learned to stop while he was ahead, never mind to keep his stupid mouth **shut** in the Dark Lord's presence except for "Yes my Lord" and "No my Lord", he'd added "In Alchemy". 

"Alchemy eh. You really think that **muggles** have something they can teach us?" 

He'd felt the temperature drop then. Arrogant idiot, he should have realised that the Dark Lord would have that reaction! 

Gods, what had he done? Oh well, keep going, this might just be a test. Might not be any retake for this one though.... 

"They aren't up to our standards my Lord, but they have kept some things alive, and are developing others. We can take what they know and use it. I'd need to go to a Muggle university. But once I have what they know, I can combine it with the real learning, and use that to strike at our enemies." 

Finally, after what seemed like days, his throat closing with building tension... 

"It will be. Enjoyable. To blast that filth with their own learning. Very well. Arrange it." 

He'd overlooked the hatred in the words, or rather it hadn't bothered him then. Muggles, mudbloods, all the mediocre, what did they matter? 

That's how he'd thought all his life, why did it seem so odd now? 

He looked out onto the busy High Street, seeing the colourful crowds, the laughter, the life in it all. He thought of the library with all that learning in it, the lab with amazing machines and tools and charts, how could they be worthless if they had produced all that? 

And how could he keep doing what he was doing? Best not think of that. Just concentrate on exams, and after that, the PM research. 

Don't think about what it's used for, don't think about the jobs you are asked to do. Think about the nice clean world of the lab, and the library. Think about those. 

Of course eventually he had to think about what he was doing. Think about the fact that it did matter that the people he'd met, and lived with, and laughed with, and argued with, and learned from, and yelled at, and that one time got drunk with, were Muggles. 

The problem with having a trained intellect was that once you had a fact that didn't fit the hypothesis, you couldn't ignore it. Facts. Too damn many facts, if you could call the way people screamed a fact. 

The absolute danger he was in right now, approaching the enemy's stronghold that had been home for seven years, that was a fact. The fear of the Dark Lord, that was a fact. 

But the Muggles he'd met - his teachers, his classmates, they were facts too. The screams and the roiling in his belly as he carried out his orders, they were facts. 

You can't continue like this. Alchemy and learning and awarding of degrees are nothing in a world where babies are smashed against walls to break their parents down, or just because someone with the tattooed mark thinks it is fun. Or because they had a label on them saying "not one of us". 

He'd been one of **them**, that year. And that was a fact. 

The only thing he could do with all these facts was what he was doing now, and he had no idea what the end result would be. There was no prior research to guide him. 

All he could do was knock on that door and say "Headmaster? I need to talk to you". 

* * *

* * *

The title is a reference to the Peter Weir film "The Year of Living Dangerously". More just because the title sounded right than the subject matter, but in a way they both deal with different cultures and having to deal with the effects of living in a different country in a time of danger. 

Yes, I do think sliderules are way cool, even if I am a computer geek by profession. I still have my father's Faber Castell that I used in high school and even in university. Catch someone having a calculator as a family heirloom! 

And lastly... is anyone reading this? 


End file.
